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To evaluate the associated factors leading to misdiagnosis with VTIQ for differentiation between benign from malignant thyroid nodules (TNs). The study included 238 benign TNs and 150 malignant TNs. Conventional ultrasound (US) features and VTIQ parameters were obtained and compared with the reference standard of histopathological and/or cytological results. Binary logistic regression analysis was performed to select independent variables leading to misdiagnosis. The maximum shear wave speed (SWS) (SWS-max), mean SWS (SWS-mean), SWS-ratio and standard deviation of SWS (SWS-SD) were significantly higher for malignant TNs compared with benign TNs (all P < 0.001). SWS-mean achieved the highest diagnostic performance with a cut-off value of 3.15 m/s. False positive rate was 13.4% (32/238) while false negative rate was 35.3% (53/150). Intranodular calcification (OR: 1.715) was significantly associated with false positive VTIQ findings, while nodule size (OR: 0.936) and echotexture of the thyroid gland (OR: 0.033) were negatively associated with them. Nodule depth (OR: 0.881) and TI-RADS category (OR: 0.563) were negatively associated with false negative VTIQ findings. These US characteristic of TNs should be taken into consideration when interpreting the results of VTIQ examinations.

Virtual Reality (VR) technologies have been widely applied to the field of architecture education because of its unique immersion. There have been many researches on hardware and platform development in the world. However, there are relatively few on User Interface (UI) design. This is a study of UI design in VR applications applied in architectural education, which aims to improve users' learning performance. Through a previous study and other scholars' researches, four key factors have been extracted from the challenges of UI design in VR applications: navigation modes, operation methods, observation scales and background options. A set of experiments were conducted based on correlation analysis with 120 students of these four factors and learning performance. It is concluded that fishing mode with instantaneous movement is preferred rather than flying mode in HTC Vive navigation; the way of direct grasp in virtual operation performs better than the way of using an operational proxy in virtual construction process; a virtual observation scale close to body-and-mockup in real world performs best; contribution of a background environment in VR is not as significant as expected. In brief, the learning performances in a VR platform vary greatly with different UI designs. Highlights With different UI designs, the learning performances in VR vary greatly. In HTC Vive navigation, fishing mode is preferred rather than flying mode. Grasp method performs better than proxy method in virtual construction operations. A virtual observation scale close to body-and-mockup in real world performs best.